This is my favourite bread and butter pudding

Ingredients

Method

Grease a 1.7 ltr pudding basin with butter.  Butter the bread and cut off the crusts.  Cut diagonally into triangles.

Whisk the egg yolks and caster sugar together in a bowl.

Slit the vanilla pod and place in a pan with the milk and the cream and simmer.  Substitute vanilla essence if fresh pods are not available.  Sieve onto the yolks to produce custard.

Arrange the bread in layers in the pudding basin with fruit between each layer.  Finish with a final layer of bread.  Pour the custard over and leave to soak for 20 minutes before cooking.

Place the pudding basin in a roasting tray partly filled with water.  Cook for 20-30 minutes until the custard begins to set.

Remove from the water and sprinkle with caster sugar..  Place under the grill and allow the sugar to caramelize and the bread to become crisp and brown at the edges.

You can sprinkle the pudding with a little nutmeg or incorporate it with the fruit between the layers of bread.

This was a firm favorite with my mother and made a regular weekly appearance on the table.